Hollow fiber filters are used extensively in pharmaceutical, health care, water filtration, gas filtration, and fluid sterilization applications. Typically, a hollow fiber filter is made using a maximum number of hollow fiber strands that will fit tightly and uniformly within a rigid cylindrical housing. The cylindrical housing is used to protect the hollow fibers themselves, which may be delicate and susceptible to damage.
In most hollow fiber filtration processes, the desired product is the permeate, which refers to material that passes through the membrane wall. For example, in the pharmaceutical industry, target proteins are removed from the cell culture through hollow fiber filtration; where the small proteins pass through the filter pores while the much larger cells are excluded. As such, hollow fiber filters are typically designed to allow for maximized recovery of the permeate, through washing or rinsing, as well as ease of scale-up to larger, commercial systems.
Currently, there is little difference in filter design between a large filter intended for thousands of hours of service in a pharmaceutical manufacturing plant and a small lab-scale filter intended for a short service lifetime.
Thus there is a need for design simplification and cost control that will expand the use of the filter in applications where cost or design complexities are concerns.